Anatomy of a Forensic Fraud: The Reality of Drug and Alcohol Testing

The juxtaposed documents in and of themselves reveal a number of red flags. How does one “revise” a chain-of-custody”? If you do a google search you will not find “chain-of-custody” as an object of the verb revise. It is an oxymoron. A document or opinion can be revised. A chain-of-custody, by its very definition, cannot. This collusion to fabricate a positive test has coined a new oxymoron—“revised chain-of-custody.” Go ahead and look it up. It is a novel one. As it should be.

What these documents show is, in fact, indefensible ethically, procedurally and legally. The first document signed by Dr. Luis Sanchez, past President of the FSPHP and past Medical Director of Physician Health Services, Inc. (PHS) was sent to the Board of Registration in Medicine on December 11, 2012 and is notable for two statements. The letter from Dr. Sanchez asserts that “Yesterday, December 10, 2012, Physician Health Services, PHS received a revision of a laboratory test result,” but it did not matter because PHS was {unaware} ” of any action taken by the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Medicine as a result of the July 28th, 2011 report. However, based on the amended report, PHS will continue to disregard the July 21st PEth test result.”

The second document, addressed to Dr. Luis Sanchez, is dated October 4, 2012 (67 days earlier) and shows the first document to be a bald-faced lie.

On July 28h 2011 Dr. Luis Sanchez reported to the Medical Board that I had a positive alcohol test.

Although I knew that Dr. Sanchez had fabricated the test I had no way of proving it. I requested the “litigation packet,” which records “chain-of-custody” from collection to analysis in August of 2011. At first they refused. PHS then tried to dissuade me (“it will be costly, involve attorneys, etc). Finally they agreed but threatened me with “unintended consequences.”

I was finally able to get a copy of the “litigation packet” in December of 2011. Remarkably, it showed that Sanchez had requested my ID # and a “chain-of-custody” be added to an already positive specimen. I reported this to the Board but they ignored it. I also filed a complaint with the College of American Pathologists.

On October 23, 2012 Sanchez reported to the Medical Board that I was “noncompliant” with requirements with A.A. meetings that I was supposed to go to as a direct result of the positive test and my license to practice medicine was suspended as a result in December 2012.

On December 10, 2012 I contacted the College of American Pathologists who told me the test was “amended” from “positive” to “invalid” on October 4, 2012. I confronted Sanchez and PHS and they said they did not know anything about it.

The following day, December 11, 2012, they sent out a letter saying that the test was invalid but that they were “unaware of any action taken against my license as a result of the test.”

The documents show that on July 19th, 2011 Sanchez requested my ID # 1310 and a “chain-of-custody” be added to an already positive specimen and on October 4th 2012 the test was “appended” to “external chain of custody not followed per standard protocol.”

Please note again that Dr. Sanchez stated on December 11, 2012 that he “just learned” about this on December 10, 2012. He reported me to the Board as “noncompliant” on October 23, 2012 and my license was suspended in December 2012. These documents show he had full knowledge that the test was invalid and as an agent of the Board this is under “color of law.” Both he, and PHS, need to be held accountable for this.

The contradictory documents from Sanchez alone constitute a crime (withholding information in concealment and providing false information to a state agency). But what he did is far far worse.

I just obtained the October 4th document. Although I knew it existed, PHS suppressed it and refused to acknowledge it. But in response to a complaint I filed against PHS and the labs it was revealed by USDTL that the test in question (phosphatidyl-ethanol) was not sent as a “forensic” specimen but collected as a “forensic” specimen, then changed to a “clinical” specimen at the request of PHS Program Director, Linda Bresnahan. The specimen was kept at the collecting lab (Quest) for 7 days as a “clinical” specimen, then sent to the analyzing lab (USDTL) with specific instructions from Quest to process it and report it as a “clinical” specimen. PHS then used it as a “forensic” specimen by reporting me to the Board of Registration in Medicine and requesting I undergo an evaluation for alcohol abuse.

As a “clinical” specimen it is rendered “Protected Health Information” (PHI) and thus under the HIPAA Privacy-Rule. So with the help of the College of American Pathologists I requested my PHI from both Quest and USDTL. Quest refused (for obvious reasons) but USDTL complied. And that is how I was able to obtain the October 4th document revealing that Dr. Sanchez lied to the Medical Board. I would love to hear him, or PHS MRO Wayne Gavryck, defend the indefensible (and unconscionable).

Dr. Sanchez is correct when he pleads ignorance of any action taken by the Board as a result of the July 21st PEth result. It was his report to the Medical Board that I was “noncompliant” with attending AA meetings (that I was supposed to go to as the direct and sole result of the positive test) that he reported to the Board just two weeks after the October 4th appended test.

The test was sent as a “clinical” specimen intentionally. PHS is not a clinical provider but a monitoring agency. They cannot send clinical samples. But since clinical samples are “protected health information” and under HIPAA the lab had to give me the records and here you have them.

The distinction between “forensic” and “clinical” drug and alcohol testing is black and white. PHS is a monitoring program not a treatment provider. The fact that a monitoring agency with an MRO asked the lab to process and report it as a clinical sample and then used it forensically is an extreme outlier in terms of forensic fraud. The fact that they collected it forensically, held it for 7 days and changed it from “forensic” to “clinical” to bypass strict “chain-of-custody” requirements deepens the malice. The fact that they then reported it to the Board as a forensic sample and maintained it was forensic up until now makes it egregious. But the fact that the test was changed from “positive” to “invalid” on October 4th, 2012 and Sanchez then reported me to the Board on October 23rd 2012 for “noncompliance,” suppressed it and tried to send me to Kansas for damage control makes it wantonly egregious. (they didn’t think I’d ever find out).

Add on that the fact that I’ve been questioning the validity of the test since day 1 and they violated the HIPAA Privacy Rule over and over and this is reckless and major health care fraud.

Fax from PHS to USDTL on July 19th, 2011 asking that my ID #1310 be added to an already positive test and a “chain-of-custody” be “updated”

USDTL complies with PHS request to and adds my ID #1310 and a date of collection (July 1, 2011) to an already positive specimen

16 thoughts on “Anatomy of a Forensic Fraud: The Reality of Drug and Alcohol Testing”

You are brave beyond survuving a concentration camp brave. Keep up the fight. You can’t and should not try to expose and correct this abuse of power and illegal coercion into a dangerous cult religion. Your story makes me want to scream and pull my hair out and … Well let’s just say behave in a way that would not end well for the people who are trying to hurt you. This is criminal.

Keep writing about it and please do reach out to me often. There has got to be measures we can take that will expose this fraud and abuse … For forcing anyone into the 12 steps is abuse of the most emotional damaging kind, whether a doctor or a garbage collector. Threatening your life and ability to take care of your family by falsifying medical tests is unethical to the extreme.

Thank you for demonstrating such bravery. This is frightening stuff, not for the faint of heart … To the general public who has been led to believe 12 step groups are benign self-help groups when they are religious indoctrination disguised as medicine. No one is safe. Not even doctors.

[…] sum this up I knew that the test was fabricated at the time and it was subsequently verified as fabricated ), I simply wanted a fair and objective evaluation from an assessment facility with no […]

[…] sum this up I knew that the test was fabricated at the time and it was subsequently verified as fabricated ), I simply wanted a fair and objective evaluation from an assessment facility with no […]

[…] The procedural, ethical and criminal violations are clear and many. The incontrovertible evidence has been directly delivered to individuals who should address this but for some reason do not. This is not a matter of opinion folks but a matter of fact.Time and time again we hear of egregious misconduct hidden for decades because of cognitive dissonance and blinkered apathy. […]

[…] He didn’t do that here. In fact for more than a year he helped cover up an alcohol test that was intentionally fabricated at the behest of PHS Director of Operations Linda Bresnahan. It took a formal complaint with the College of American Pathologists to get the truth out. The whole fiasco can be seen here and here. […]

Let’s move forward to peer-review:
– It will set the record straight (once and for all)
– It could prevent this injustice committed against other honest doctors (like I’m sure you are) in the future.
In fact: it could be more than one paper…
P.S. please do not publish this comment (let’s schedule a Skype meeting or a message chat by Facebook)
My accounts:https://www.facebook.com/jorgehernanramirez
skype: jorgehramirezescobar

Wow. He wants to help but he needs to stay anonymous. Only in a case of extreme fraud and coercion would he need to remain anonymous. Please excuse the word anonymous and all its affiliations with the cult in question.

Thank you for sharing this with me. Please keep me abreast of the process of this exchange. Mr. Heller (or another attorney), may be interested in this.